Clark County Land Use Planning Department – Driven by corrupt ideologues

The abuse of Clark County’s rural citizens by the Clark County government has been established in a few past ClarkCounty.info articles. Since these articles, we’ve received considerable and corroborated information about the arrogance, corruption, and incompetence of the Clark County planning director, other senior bureaucrats, and the three liberal county councilors (Marc Bolt, Julie Olson, and Jeanne Stewart). There is so much new and disturbing information that we only have room to list the issues here. We will expand upon them in future articles as more is learned and confirmed. The list of issues are:

More abuse of rural land owners: Recent articles on ClarkCounty.info told the general story about the disregard of rural citizens by the ideologically driven planning department and the new liberal councilor majority that endorses this abuse (article #1, article #2). There’s legal precedent that land owners can claim damages and receive relief if government regulation changes the value of their property. This will be developed in future articles. A similar battle is occurring in Thurston County and there may be collaboration with them in the effort to push back and correct this situation (article).

Violations of growth management act (GMA) law: There’s strong evidence that the Clark County planning department appears to be using tools and processes to calculate certain key planning numbers to fit their high-density agenda. The problem is that in 1994 Clark County judge Poyfair ordered the county to stop using these tools and processes for rural land planning, as they developed ideologically-driven results. In recent public and private meetings the senior staff tried to dismiss the presence of these tools and processes, but the facts show otherwise. This appears to be a willful disregard of court-ordered direction because they needed the results the banned models would produce. Now they try and cover up that this occurred.

Collusion with certain developers: This is a typical problem with small groups of people; their friends and supporters somehow receive favorable treatment. In this regard we’ve received accounts from landowners and developers who’ve not been on this favored list, or worse were treated poorly. Our first story on this topic will be about a land owner who was slated to be included in the Camas urban growth boundary, but was taken out at the last minute, apparently because he wouldn’t play along with a particular developer’s wishes. It appears this developer had political influence (campaign contributions) with elected commissioners and those county planning managers developing the periodic planning, driven by the GMA.

False statements made to elected officials: According to Washington State law (RCW 9a.76.175) it’s a gross misdemeanor to make willful false statements to elected officials. We now have evidence of numerous breaches of this state law by the senior county staff, specifically the top bureaucrat in the Clark County Planning Department and staff attorneys.

Planning director files complaint against Councilor Madore: The head of the Clark County community planning department is Oliver Orjiako. He’s been employed by the county for approximately 25 years. His promotion to lead the Community Planning Department appears to be a function of his implied loyalty to the wishes of the big-government machine in Clark County. He’s a high-density ideologue which seems to be a (usually unspoken) requirement for hire or promotion in most ‘progressive’ governments. It was predictable that Mr. Orjiako would be an obstacle to different thinking and would act to protect the self-interest of the Clark County political establishment. Because councilor Madore has been deconstructing the Clark County big-government Oliver_Orjiakomachine and fighting the self-interest of various politicians and senior bureaucrats, he’s had many differences with Mr. Orjiako. The filing of a complaint of Councilor Madore is doubtlessly a tactic to slow down Madore and increase public doubt about him. Mr. Orjiako and his attorney are even playing the ‘race card,’ which is nearly always done as a scare tactic to the accused. We’re aware of a number of county employees willing to speak out publically that this ‘complaint’ is political, that Mr. Orjiako is making many false statements and hoping for false conclusions for those observing his efforts to defame and discourage Madore. This matter will be the subject of a few more articles as more is learned. Mr. Orjiako, his lawyer, and other handlers will find that this malicious tactic will backfire on them.

This arrogant and offensive behavior by Mr. Orjiako, other senior bureaucrats, and the three liberal county councilors would have worked in days past when citizens were not really watching and lacked low cost methods to publish facts to tens of thousands of county citizens. This of course is a different day.   ClarkCounty.info is telling thousands of citizens about our local problems. When reasonable people receive this information they’re almost always dismayed and many will become involved to push back on this corruption and incompetence.

We’re also aware of a number of lawsuits pending and being contemplated against the corruption of the three liberal councilors and senior staff leading this poor behavior. The actions of the three liberal county councilors and some senior bureaucrats is of a nature that legal action may name the individuals and not just the county—especially Mr. Orjiako’s false and misleading statements against Councilor Madore. It’s that bad.

The ClarkCounty.info team is working on articles to provide details for the items listed above. Sources will be vetted and information is always confirmed.